damned_institute | Night 44: Main Hall, 2-West

What Setsuna first thought was a simple malfunction in his flashlight quickly grew into something alarmingly unusual. He would have attributed it to the batteries suddenly dying, if not for the sudden pain shooting up his head.

A cry of pain escaped his lips as he took a step back, his free hand automatically darting to his head, the pain only appearing to increase in intensity. He gritted his teeth, the grip on his flashlight automatically tightening, and then whirled around as he heard the strange, rattling sound.

He attempted to focus on the source of the sound despite the excruciating pain and took another step back. Where is it? What is causing it?

"S-Stay close," he managed to warn Feldt. The hand on his head drifted to one of his pockets, fingers curling lightly around one of the pieces of mirror shards he had acquired earlier. He wasn't certain if the person (monster?) where the sound came from was also causing the pain, but if they were, then he will fight them.

Yet again -- stay close might have been a wise idea, were they being attacked from the outside, but for the two patients to remain close to each other now was not quite the best idea. The death-rattle surrounding them continued to grow louder, almost painfully so, and yet still seemed to have no discernable point of origin.

At the same time, the pain in the back of Setsuna's head continued to grow, making it feel as if his skull was splitting open and something really was scraping its way out of the opening -- and yet nothing discernable could be seen.

Except ... was that black hair seeping out from amongst his own curly locks. And, if anyone was looking very closely ... were those fingers peeking out here and there as he moved?

Perhaps things would be easier to see if their flashlights didn't appear to be finally giving out -- with one last bright flicker, both lights started to fade out in that tell-tale way, giving them perhaps a few minutes left of dimming light, at most.

"Setsuna!" Feldt cried, wondering what they were currently being attacked by. She looked around, swinging her flashlight about to see if she could see anything - although her attempts proved to be unsuccessful. Setsuna was crying out in pain and... she wasn't sure where it could possibly be coming from. As far as she could tell, she couldn't see anything. The light was beginning to dim further, and she wasn't sure what was causing the problem.

The first thing she had to do was attempt to see how badly Setsuna was injured, considering that he was crying out in pain - he had to have been wounded by something. She decided to make use of the dim light of the flashlight to check.

... Although, as far as she could tell, there was no wound. There wasn't anything there that would indicate a wound. What was going on?

She wasn't expecting to see fingers, though - that had to be an illusion of some sort. Maybe it was a trick that was being caused the dim light.

Another scream of pain now as Setsuna dropped his flashlight—he hadn't even noticed its dimming glow, because suddenly the pain was agonizing and his eyes had squeezed tight automatically. The hand inside his pocket also slipped out and joined the one now pressing against the back of his head in an attempt to stop the excruciating pressure, or perhaps to search for exactly what was causing it (and in one corner of his mind was concern over Feldt Grace's status: Was she also attacked? Can she fight back?)—and then the sound of something grew louder and then he couldn't concentrate on his thoughts anymore; he bit down his tongue to prevent another cry from escaping his lips, a feeble attempt at defiance, as if refusing to give in to the agonizing pain would make it abruptly stop.

Finally, the pain bore fruition: one moment there was flickering light and the ever-increasing sound, and then suddenly there was an entire human hand emerging from the back of Setsuna's head. And though there was no discernable opening from which it could have come, the boy would feel the pain as keenly as if something really had burst forth from his skull.

The hand was pale, almost a bluish-grey instead of the colour of normal human skin -- and it was bloodied, dark blood oozing from beneath fingernails and running in thin rivulets along fingers, palm, wrist. With what looked like a painful tug, it tore a little further out of Setsuna's head, the beginnings of an arm following after it.

Enough for the hand to reach down and grab a handful of the back of Setsuna's shirt, apparently yanking on it in an effort to gain more leverage to pull the rest of ... whatever it was out.

This was definitely something that wasn't very good - and something that definitely wasn't normal. Not that normal things seemed to be a common occurrence in a place such as this. Feldt couldn't find a way to stay completely calm when there was a hand coming out of Setsuna's head, and whatever it was, it seemed to be doing its best to get out. She wasn't sure about what was going on at all - there were so many things in the institute that she didn't know about or understood completely.

She wasn't about to abandon Setsuna though, regardless of what was happening to him (or whatever monster seemed to be forcing itself out of his head). He was a member of her family, and she wasn't going to leave him behind while he was hurt. She disliked having to see him in pain. They had to stick together in a situation like this.

But she couldn't help but stare at the hand forcing itself out of Setsuna's head in horror.

Setsuna fell onto his knees, sweat trickling down his temples, his breathing heavy. He was used to pain, he's been through a lot of experiences of being wounded, attacked, electrocuted, and still this... It seemed almost unbearable.

But he couldn't, he can't give in to it. Feldt Grace was still around and he did not intend to leave her. In the midst of his agony he felt something brush across his fingers. What was it?

He drew out blood as he bit down his tongue a little too hard, the red liquid trickling down the side of his mouth. With a trembling hand, he forced himself to draw out one of the mirror shards from his pocket, accidentally laying a finger on the sharpened edges.

He cried out again—combined with the head-splitting (quite literally) pain, he couldn't help it. But he still forced himself to take the mirror shard out of his pocket, and attempted to grab whatever it was on his head and slice the shard across it.

The sharp slice of mirrored glass over the flesh of the arm did seem to give it pause for a second -- but just for a second. Dark black blood welled up very slowly across the cut, seeping very slightly through skin, but it failed to flow. As if the thing was constructed of dead flesh, and only the remnants of pressure was forcing the liquid to the surface, the slice parted now as the arm jerked back into motion with more exertion, yanking hard on Setsuna's shirt.

Slowly, upper arm and shoulder forced their way through Setsuna's head, and then the thing seemed to stall for a second -- and then Setsuna felt something at the very back of his mouth, as if there was a large chunk of some kind of meat lodged in his throat.

It pressed hard on the back of his tongue, then moved. Several distinct objects seemed to nudge forward along his tongue for a moment, and then the shape became clear. Fingers were scrabbling up out of his throat, fingers attached to a hand: if Feldt took a good look into his mouth right now, she would see blood seeping out from under the nails of this hand as well. Then again, it probably wasn't necessary to look, for Setsuna -- he'd definitely be able to notice that coppery taste in his mouth.

Though it was true that he might be preoccupied, since the hand that was sliding out of his throat was not only probably quite painful but obstructing his airway, a minute gap for breath closing rapidly as the fingers reached his teeth.

Whatever was happening to Setsuna just seemed to keep getting worse - and Feldt had absolutely no idea how to handle the situation. This was nothing like anything she had previously experienced, and it was definitely far worse than the bats the previous night. She wasn't sure what to do - although she knew that she wanted to try to help Setsuna out as best as she could. She'd remained in fairly good shape because of Setsuna's protection.

And whatever this was, she wasn't going to let it hurt her family that easily. She didn't have anything to fight with though - at least, nothing that would be of use. Setsuna was the only one with any sort of weapon here. She was worried about him, though, and reached out to grab the glass shard that Setsuna had in his hand, trying to be as careful as possible as she took the sharp object from his grip. She didn't want him to hurt himself while trying to take care of the monster - the monster was clearly already hurting him enough - and she wanted to do her best to protect him.

So she was going to try to do just that. She slashed at the monster like Setsuna had done as well, although it was a fairly cautious swing. She didn't want to hurt Setsuna on accident.

He didn't even know if he had managed to wound whatever it was—considering that the pain was still a constant, it was likely he did not.

And then came the object rising from his throat. His throat muscles automatically constricted around whatever it was, and he bent forward as he tried to gasp for air but barely managed fill his lungs as he felt something press against his tongue and attempt to crawl out of him. An automatic cry of pain attempted to escape from him, but he only managed a choke instead as the object reached further into his mouth.

He could sense Feldt grabbing the shard from his hand. He wanted to protest but he suddenly choked a second time, one hand rising to clutch his neck and the other pressing against the floor. The taste of blood was in his mouth and he grew dizzy from the lack of air, and as he forced himself to stay conscious an emotion he never thought he could feel again suddenly emerged—the combination of uncertainty, horror, lack of control, in a place that was so unfamiliar and a situation greatly unknown... he was scared.

Tears began to stream down his cheeks, but even then, even in the bleakness of the situation and utter helplessness he felt, he was still fighting for his life. He cannot afford to leave a still twisted world behind. He needed to live, to live until the world changed. That was his purpose.

And because of that, he was not going to die.

Motivation was good. Probably -- because here he might have been better served by simply allowing himself to pass out from oxygen deprivation. The hand in his mouth had grabbed onto his jaw, now, and was using it to tug the rest of the limb out of his throat. One excruciating inch, then another jerked forward, and then with what seemed like a burst of strength an arm tore forward to the elbow. It dangled for just a second, then reached up and grabbed onto the hair at the top of his head.

Where it commenced pulling, just like the other arm, as if trying to pull something out -- and even as it jerked and twitched as if succeeding, no visible damage could be seen on Setsuna's body. When Feldt slashed out she caught another patch of dead flesh, caused another minute ooze of rotted blood, but the intruder didn't stop.

And slowly, slowly but surely, something was emerging, close to where the first hand had appeared -- a dark substance that soon became clear was hair sprouted out from amongst Setsuna's, slithering outwards like some grotesque fountain. With a jerk, another fall of it appeared, and then the top of something, twitching a little as if in exertion. Both hands continued pulling, tugging, and another quick convulsion of movement revealed the top of a head: just enough to see a pair of eyes peering out amongst hair.

A blank stare, unknowing and uncaring for anything but murder. The death-rattle filled the air again.

Night 44: Main Hall, 2-West

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